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tv   [untitled]    November 19, 2011 12:00am-12:30am PST

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i live right across the street. i did not know there was a petition. i did not sign it. i did want to come and voice my support. bistro gambrinus is one of the things i really like about my neighborhood. i have never seen anything on the street. it has got great food and great beer. i can see by the people here supporting it, it brings together all kinds of people. it is a unique place in the city. urination and vomiting, i have not seen any of those things in front. i walk by all the time. my apartment is 100 yards away.
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that is all that i have to say. thank you. >> good afternoon. i live right around the corner. i have lived there for 26 years. i have seen that neighborhood to go from a frightening place. since i have moved here, the neighborhood has just gotten better. the people that own this are fantastic. the ethnic diversity of the merchants in the neighborhood is evident. they just opened a french restaurant on my corner. it is a wonderful neighborhood. it has long been a wonderful their bread. i have not seen any of the
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things that have been alleged. i have never seen it too crowded. i have not seen anybody drunk. the people i know that go there regularly note not to have people to close to the door. it is a busy intersection. it is a great neighborhood. these people are wonderful addition to the neighborhood. >> thank you, my name is mark. i have been to the restaurant many, many times. i think it is fantastic and clean. my concern is that if they left,
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most likely, there would be another restaurant and we would be in the sense of situation again. what i'm most like about clair, you may not know that she is a physician, she is obviously a very compassionate person. you would have to be somewhat reasonable to have that position. sergei and claire are willing to work with these people. they are not vindictive. they want to make sure that the restaurant prospers. you want the whole neighborhood to enjoy it. i live right across the street. it is very loud. it is noisy. what i have noticed is that you want to move to this very quiet neighborhood. around 2:00 a.m. it is very quiet and somebody will be walk around on your cell phone and it
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will sound like it is in your home, literally. sometimes what is going on during the day with the noise can be a blessing. i recommend that we support this great restaurant. thank you. >> hello. i am a patron if this restaurant along with my husband who is a test generation american and a retired professor. when we come to the restaurant, we come to eat there. my husband likes to strike a conversation with the students who are also patrons of this restaurant that come after classis to this restaurant to eat delicious foods that are
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inexpensive and wholesome. occasionally, we have a class of -- glass of beer. it is clean, it is friendly. sometimes, my husband sits and talks with the students until 10:00 when the restaurant closes. i must say that this would be a great misfortune for the students and the neighborhood if this restaurant did not exist. >> hello. i own a home health agency 2.5 blocks away. we have the employees. most of them are medical professionals. we visit the pressure on beggarly. we mostly go there for meetings. if it was a loud sports bar, we
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would not be interviewing people there. last year, we had a christmas party there. it has a great food and great service. our office is a big open space. this is the closest, nicest place we can meet. i bring my son there regularly. we go there all the time. if we go there tonight at 7:00, the parents from my fourth grade class are going to be there. they meet their once a month to discuss. if it was a loud, obnoxious barr, the parents would not choose that as a place to meet. many people do drive there because the food is unique and they have a great selection of beer. i rarely have it, but it is
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there. it is a place to go and have lunch or dinner. when i first heard about it, i laughed. these people are either vindictive or have another agenda. maybe they want to own their own restaurant. i would never take my son or my employees to a place where people are drunk and throwing up. i have never seen groups of young people there. it is usually at an average of 40-60 and then students during the day. i do not see them there during the evening. it is mostly older visiting the place. it is a nightmare to have these sorts of accusations that are unfounded. thank you.
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>> hi, commissioners. i am a patron of bistro gambrinus. i have gone there once or twice a week since its inception. we go there for a family dinner. i brought my grandparents therefore their birthdays. it is a very friendly place. we go there because of the food. i think it is the single best, i would call it russian restaurant in the city. it is on rival. i am very happy to go there to eat. i do indulge in the occasional beer. i do not go there for the purpose of getting drunk off of liquor. there are tepee -- tv's. the sound is muted. there is quiet music in the
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background. there may be a few games or cnn on the tv, just like any restaurant. one and a half pages of beers and a half a page of food. i think there are six pages of food. there are salads, soups, i do not know how you fit that on two-thirds of a page. this is a full-service restaurant. gaiters to all kinds of different people. they come there to eat and have a good time. there are too many things that just do not add up. >> good afternoon. i am the person who is working there. a few small things.
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like someone said before, we are not trying to find a conflict. we always try to talk to these young men and explain what kind of problems we have. he never even wanted to talk to us. he's just ignoring us. if something is going wrong, he should tell us and we can fix it right away. for me, there is no reason to come here because there are no big issues. it is a restaurant. some of the activities going on,
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people go in and out. that is normal. i am pretty sure it is possible to find the right way. there is no reason to have a conflict. the people who are not finding the conflict. i am sure it is possible to find the right way to negotiate the problem. that is my personal opinion. thank you. >> good day, commissioners. i am actually a manager at bistro gambrinus. i have been there since day 1.
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i helped do the menu including food and beer. i am also of the eastern european descent. i am a patron of other restaurants. i do go out. i like food , like likedbeer. it is one of my passions. it is a very neat place. we have a huge beer menu. we also have a huge food menu. it is not a sports bar. there are only a couple of places in the city that have similar food. we are one of them. i think we add to the
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neighborhood. some of the problems they described, we disagree with, but we cannot be held responsible for everything going on in the neighborhood that contains a liquor store and a bus stop and so on. >> are there additional speakers for the project sponsored? >> i am the owner of the restaurant. i want to thank you and the planning commissioners. and my supporters who came to support. that is great. we are working very hard. my goal is to keep the peace and understanding between the neighbors. not a single time to the request your of the d.r. come to me and say here is the problem, let's talk. our goal is to be as we are.
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a full-service, eastern european restaurant. we would like to solve the problem peacefully. i would be very happy to talk to anybody including my next-door neighbors. thank you. >> are there any additional speakers in support of the project sponsor. seeing none, project requestor. >> thank you, commissioner, madam president. clearly, there are very respectable people in the room. they seem to patronize and enjoy the restaurant as well. the restaurant doesn't cater to parties that go on late at night
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well past closing time. they do generate a high number of drunks and they do make the neighborhood un safe. natalia and i live immediately next door. we are terribly inconvenienced and feel threatened by the people that often stand outside. they have stood in the way of natalia. they stand in my way as i approached the home. i am not as easily intimidated as natalia is. none of this is a fabrication. there are police reports i corroborate this. i would also welcome the
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opportunity to talk to the owners of the restaurant. i would like to do it in front of some authority like you. they first moved in. i made an effort to work with sergei. he was parked in front of my driveway. he dumped his garbage in my garbage cans. i asked him not to. he continued to do so even more. his delivery trucks, at random times. they frequently blocked our driveway. i asked him not to allow that to happen. thank you. >> project sponsor, you have two minutes. >> as you have heard from representatives throughout the city, this is a respectable establishment.
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the most recent ratings of the restaurant was 100. really, i feel for the applicants. this is not the appropriateness avenue for some of the allegations. all of them have been addressed by different departments. bistro gambrinus has been cleared of all of the allegations. these are very difficult economic times for us all. for small businesses. they are doing a phenomenal job. i support you all to support the permit application and 90 d.r. application -- deny the d.r. application.
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>> thank you. the public hearing is closed. vice-president miguel: i wish i knew who the building owner or realtor was that are rigidly least the place to the current proprietor's. if they had done their job in an ethical manner, they would have let them know what was necessary to do to open this type of business there. we have no control over that. perhaps with the change in restaurant definitions, which we heard earlier today, some of this will go away. i have been to the restaurant, i have been there, and i have enjoyed a beer there. this is a situation where if it
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were german, i would call it a beer stool. if it was english, i would call a pub. they are places you go to eat and enjoy beer. theuy must have 75 beers on their menu, one of the larger selections in san francisco. we are getting more and more places that cater to european beers, the beer's you can get on the west coast of the united states. they have a very extensive menu. at the time i was in there, there were young couples, there were groups of obvious students. the days i was there, the
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establishment did not exist. there were very few places to eat at that time. i am really surprised that so many people come from all over the city. i have no idea where they parked. i was lucky and found a parking space within two blocks. it is a very clean, interesting, small restaurant. it is not that big. under 50 people. there are tv's. there are tv's in hotel bars now. that does not make it a sports bar. you are not going to watch a comedy show or a mystery show because without sound, it is not
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going to make sense. you watch sports because that is what you can follow on the tv's. as far as people spilling out into the streets, it has got a door. it is not as if the entire front is open to the street. people are going to go outside and smoke. they do wso in every establishment in san francisco. there is no law against it. until there is, it is legal. it is just that simple. i see no problem in taking d.r. and approving the project with conditions because it's operating in exactly the manner that the code requires.
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if there are police problems, that is up to the police department to solve and not up to us. i am not seeing anyone bringing in any actions from the police department. i am going to move to take d.r. and approve with conditions. that it can operate as it is currently. >> second. >> i would like to clarify one thing. the restaurant's current hours of operations are 12:00 p.m. until 10:00 p.m. monday through wednesday. they are not open on sundays. do you still go to a 11:00 p.m.
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on sundays? i would like to clarify our new web site, you can say that we can also accommodate large parties of up to 200 people at the banquet hall. that is a different place. are you planning to extend the hours? do you know? >> commissioners, the motion on the floor is to approve the project with established conditions as drafted by staff. on that motion. commissioner antonini: aye. commissioner fong: aye. commissioner moore: aye. vice-president miguel: aye. president olague: aye. >> thank you, commissioners. that motion passes unanimously. president olague: is there any general public comment on items not on the agenda? seeing none, the general public
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comment is closed and the meeting is adjourned.
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